Keesha's House Read online

  And in particular, what drew you to poetry?

  Poetry moves through things of the world, into ideas, emotions, and deep connections. It drew me to itself.

  What sparked your imagination for Keesha’s House?

  Although the characters in Keesha’s House are fictional, I spent many hours, in many places, listening with deep respect to teens who were struggling with hard problems. This led me to imagine a place where they might find help and support. Then the characters moved in and came to have lives of their own as the story took shape in my mind.

  What do you want readers to remember about your books?

  Something beautiful and true that they find in the language.

  Is there anything specific you would like readers to pull from this book?

  I hope my readers will know that they are seen and appreciated, whoever they are, whatever their own life experience.

  Which of the characters in Keesha’s House is most like you?

  There’s something of myself in each character:

  Like Harris, I sometimes feel that I live in the world differently than most people.

  Like Katie, if someone is hurting me, I walk away from them.

  Like Stephie, I’m determined to make my own decisions, even when people who love me question those decisions. (This was more true when I was a teenager than it is now.)

  Like Carmen, I’ve made some big mistakes and learned from them.

  Like Jason, I sometimes have to make decisions that require me to balance my career with my responsibility to those I love.

  Like Dontay, I’m at my best in an atmosphere of genuine acceptance.

  Like Keesha, I’ve learned that sometimes it’s not possible to prevent something bad from happening to someone I love. And also like Keesha, it’s easier for me to help others than to ask for help when I need it.

  It seems to me that most readers respond to the book in this way—finding something of themselves in each of the characters. When the characters’ voices are linked in the final crown of sonnets, readers may feel these different aspects of themselves coming together in friendship, as the characters do.

  A NEW POEM FOR READERS OF KEESHA’S HOUSE

  A SLOW STEP

  If some night you walk down a street

  so deep inside a chorus of sad voices

  that you cannot—simply can’t—look up,

  and it all seems impossible,

  too late, unforgivable and no way out;

  if you’ve already walked right past

  whatever light there is: see if you can

  let one foot come to rest on a smooth stone—

  can you feel the ancient warmth

  pressed into it? Take another step,

  a slow step, another,

  another,

  and another.

  This poem was published, with an accompanying photograph, in an e-book anthology that can be found by putting these words into a search engine: “Poetry Tag Time for Teens, Sylvia Vardell and Janet Wong, Editors.”

  TRY WRITING A TRITINA

  Have you tried writing a sestina? I know you can do it, and I think you’ll enjoy trying.

  But if you think the sestina is too much of a challenge, here’s a form you could try first.

  A “tritina” is something like a sestina, but with three endwords instead of six.

  TRITINA FORM

  *Ten-line poem

  *Three three-line stanzas and one one-line stanza.

  *The endwords (last words in the lines) repeat in this pattern:

  ____________________ Word A

  ____________________ Word B

  ____________________ Word C

  ____________________ Word C

  ____________________ Word A

  ____________________ Word B

  ____________________ Word B

  ____________________ Word C

  ____________________ Word A

  ____________________ Words A, B, and C

  (Use all three words in the last line.)

  Note: An example of a tritina, along with examples of twenty-three other poetic forms, and descriptions of the forms, can be found in my book Spinning Through the Universe, also published by Frances Foster Books/Farrar Straus Giroux. Work sheets of some of the forms can be found on my Web site: helenfrost.net.

  Twelve-year-old Willow stumbles upon disaster when she mushes a dog team to her grandparents’ house.

  Can an unusual set of friends make things right again?

  Read on to read an excerpt from

  Diamond Willow

  by HELEN FROST.

  In

  the

  middle

  of my family

  in the middle of

  a middle-size town

  in the middle of Alaska,

  you will find middle-size,

  middle-kid, me. My father

  teaches science in the middle

  of my middle school. My mother

  is usually in the middle of my house.

  My brother, Marty, taller and smarter

  than I ever hope to be, goes to college in

  big-city Fairbanks. My sister, Zanna (short

  for Suzanna), is six years younger and

  twelve inches shorter than I am.

  She follows me everywhere—

  except for the dog yard.

  I don’t know why

  my little sister is

  so scared of

  dogs.

  What

  I love

  about dogs:

  They don’t talk

  behind your back.

  If they’re mad at you,

  they bark a couple times

  and get it over with. It’s true

  they slobber on you sometimes.

  (I’m glad people don’t do that.) They

  jump out and scare you in the dark. (I know,

  I should say me, not “you”—some people aren’t

  afraid of anything.) But dogs don’t make fun

  of you. They don’t hit you in the back

  of your neck with an ice-covered

  snowball, and if they did, and

  it made you cry, all their

  friends wouldn’t stand

  there laughing

  at you.

  (Me.)

  Three

  votes! Did they

  have to announce that?

  Why not just say, Congratulations

  to our new Student Council representative,

  Richard Olenka. Why say how many votes each

  person got (12, 7, 3)? I don’t know why I decided to

  run in the first place. A couple people said I should,

  and I thought, Why not? (I don’t like staying after

  school, and no one would listen to me even if

  I did have anything to say, which I don’t.)

  Now here I am, home right after school,

  and as soon as we finish feeding

  the dogs, Dad says, Willow,

  could you help me clean

  out the woodshed?

  I say, Okay, but

  it feels like

  I’m getting

  punished

  for being

  a loser.

  We’re

  cleaning

  the woodshed,

  and I lift up a tarp.

  An old gray stick falls out.

  Just a stick. Why does it even catch

  my eye? Dad, what is this? I turn it over in

  my hands a few times; Dad studies it for a couple

  minutes, and then he gets so excited he almost pops.

  Willow, let me tell you about this! What you have

  found is more than just an old stick. This is the

  diamond willow stick I found that afternoon,

  just before you were born! Can it be—

  let’s see—twelve years ago already?

  All this time, I thought it was lost.


  He hands it back to me like it’s

  studded with real diamonds.

  This belongs to you now.

  Use your sharpest knife

  to skin off the bark.

  Find the diamonds.

  Polish the whole

  thing. It will

  be beautiful,

  Dad says.

  You’ll

  see.

  I

  came

  out here to

  the mudroom

  so I could be alone

  and make a mess while I

  think my own thoughts and

  skin the bark off my stick. But it’s

  impossible to be alone in this house.

  Mom: Willow, don’t use that sharp knife

  when you’re mad. I say, I’m not mad, Mom,

  just leave me alone! and she looks at me like

  I proved her point. Then, on my very next cut,

  the knife slips and I rip my jeans (not too bad;

  luckily, Mom doesn’t seem to notice). Maybe I

  should go live with Grandma. I bet she’d let me

  stay out there with her and Grandpa. She could

  homeschool me. I think I’d do better in math if

  I didn’t worry about how I’m going to get a bad

  grade while Kaylie gets her perfect grades on

  every test, then shows me her stupid paper,

  and asks how I did, and, if I show her,

  offers to help me figure out where

  I went wrong, “so you can

  do better next time,

  Willow.”

  I

  want

  to mush

  the dogs out

  to Grandma and

  Grandpa’s. By myself.

  I know the way. I’ve been

  there about a hundred times

  with Dad and Mom, and once

  with Marty when he lived at home.

  Their cabin is close to the main trail.

  I know I’m not going to get lost, and I

  won’t see a baby moose or any bears this

  time of year. Even if I did, I’d know enough

  to get out of the way, fast. But Mom and

  Dad don’t seem to see it this way. What

  do they think will happen? Dad at least

  thinks about it: She’s twelve years old;

  it’s twelve miles. Maybe we could

  let her try. Mom doesn’t

  even pause for half a

  second before

  she says,

  No

  !

  Maybe

  they’ll let me go

  if I just take three dogs,

  and leave three dogs here for Dad.

  I’d take Roxy, of course—she’s smart

  and fast and she thinks the same way I do.

  Magoo is fun. He doesn’t have much experience,

  but if I take Cora, she’d help Magoo settle down.

  Dad would want one fast dog. I’ll leave Samson

  here with him. Lucky might try to get loose

  and follow me down the trail again, like

  the last time we left her, but this time

  Dad will be here to help Mom

  get her back. Prince can be

  hard to handle; it will be

  easier without him.

  If Dad sees how

  carefully I’m

  thinking this

  through, he

  might help

  convince

  Mom.

  I

  beg

  Mom:

  Please!

  I’d only take

  three dogs. You know

  I can handle them. You’ve

  seen me. She won’t listen. You

  are not old enough, she says. Or

  strong enough. I make a face (should

  not have done that). Mom starts in: A moose

  will charge at three dogs as fast as it will charge

  at six. A three-dog team can lose the trail, or pull you

  out onto thin ice. What if your sled turns over, or you lose

  control of the team? (Mom really goes on and on once she gets

  started.) Willow, you could be alone out there with a dog fight

  on your hands. (Oh, right, Mom, like I’ve never stopped a

  dog fight by myself.) When Mom finally stops talking

  and starts thinking, I know enough to quit arguing.

  She looks me up and down like we’ve just met,

  then takes a deep breath. You really want to

  do this, don’t you, Willow? It takes me by

  surprise, and I almost say, Never mind,

  Mom, it doesn’t matter. But it does

  matter. I swallow hard and nod.

  Mom says, I’ll think about it

  and decide tomorrow.

  What if she says

  yes?

  You

  would

  trust her

  to take Roxy

  by herself? Mom

  questions Dad. They

  don’t know I’m listening.

  I know my dogs, Dad answers,

  how they are with Willow. It’s more

  that I’d trust Roxy to take her. Honey, if

  it’s up to me, I say let’s let her do this.

  I slip away before they see me.

  I’m pretty sure they’re

  going to say yes.

  (Yes!)

  I go out

  and talk to Roxy

  and Cora and Magoo.

  I think they’re going to let us go

  to Grandma and Grandpa’s by ourselves!

  I get out at noon on Friday—it’s the end of the

  quarter. We’ll leave by one, and be there before dark.

  We’ll have almost two days out there, and come home

  Sunday afternoon! Even as I let myself say it,

  I’m trying not to hope too hard.

  I know all I can do now is

  wait. It will jinx

  it for sure if

  I keep on

  begging.

  Yes,

  I have a

  wool sweater

  under my jacket.

  Extra socks, gloves,

  and, yes, I have enough

  booties for the dogs. I have

  my sleeping bag and a blanket,

  in case I get stranded somewhere

  (which of course won’t happen). Yes,

  I have matches, a headlamp, a hatchet.

  Dad keeps adding things to his checklist.

  Zanna comes up as close as she dares, keeping

  her distance from the dogs, to give me a card she

  made for Grandma. It’s cute, a picture of an otter

  sliding down a riverbank. Okay, Dad says, it looks

  like you’re all set. I know you can do this. Take it

  slow. He keeps on talking as I take my foot off

  the brake and let the dogs go. He might still

  be talking even now, yelling out last-

  minute warnings: Don’t forget to

  call us when you get there!

  Watch where the trail …

  And I can picture Mom,

  standing beside Dad,

  her arms folded tight,

  like she’s holding

  me, wrapped

  up inside

  them.

  Fox

  tracks,

  new snow,

  red-streaked sky

  and full moon rising.

  I know this trail, know

  where it gets scary. I know

  where it sometimes floods and

  freezes over. And I know Grandma

  and Grandpa will love it when they hear

  the dogs, knowing that it’s me mushing

  out to see them. I’m almost there.

  Can’t be more than half an hour

  to go. Down t
his small

  hill, past the burned

  stumps. There—I

  see the light

  by their

  door.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Helen Frost is the author of several books for young people, including Hidden, Diamond Willow, Crossing Stones, The Braid, and Keesha’s House, selected an Honor Book for the Michael L. Printz Award. Helen Frost was born in 1949 in South Dakota, the fifth of ten children. She recalls the summer her family moved from South Dakota to Oregon, traveling in a big trailer and camping in places like the Badlands and Yellowstone. Her father told the family stories before they went to sleep, and Helen would dream about their travels, her family, and their old house. “That’s how I became a writer,” she says. “I didn’t know it at the time, but all those things were accumulating somewhere inside me.” As a child, she loved to travel, think, swim, sing, learn, canoe, write, argue, sew, play the piano, play softball, play with dolls, daydream, read, go fishing, and climb trees. Now, when she sits down to write, her own experiences become the details of her stories. Helen has lived in South Dakota, Oregon, Massachusetts, New York, Vermont, Scotland, Colorado, Alaska, California, and Indiana. She currently lives in Fort Wayne, Indiana, with her family. You can sign up for email updates here.

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  CONTENTS

  TITLE PAGE

  COPYRIGHT NOTICE

  CAST OF CHARACTERS

  DEDICATION

  PART I: HOW I SEE IT

  Now This Baby (STEPHIE)

  What’s Right? (JASON)

  I Found a Place (KEESHA)

  How I See It (DONTAY)

  Some Little Thing (CARMEN)

  That One Word (HARRIS)

  My Choice (KATIE)

  PART II: WHITE WALLS

  I Hate to Be the One (STEPHIE)

  Surprised to Hear Myself (JASON)

  Questions About Joe (KEESHA)

  I Can Do It (DONTAY)